# Payap University Partnership

Two strands came out of the October 2026 conversations with Payap
University: land it would lease to the project (see
[site candidates](site-candidates.md)), and close collaboration on **new
student programmes built around the plant**: audio engineering (mastering
and lathe cutting), IT, business administration and more. This page holds
the programme strand. Nothing is agreed yet; scope, form and money are
open.

## Why it fits

- **The hardest hires are the programme subjects.** Mastering and cutting
  engineers are an open item in the
  [supplier map](suppliers/equipment-suppliers.md), and the plant needs one
  or two at maturity ([scale](scale.md)). A cutting and mastering programme
  is a hiring pipeline for the plant, and for the region.
- **Payap brings what a factory does not have**: a College of Music,
  IT, business administration and communication arts faculties, an
  International College teaching in English, and a Faculty of Pharmacy
  with analytical labs.
- **The plant brings what a university cannot**: a working cutting lathe,
  real production data and a factory application with real users.

## Programme areas against the plant

| Area | What students work on | Where it lives in this repo |
|---|---|---|
| Mastering | Mastering for the physical limits of the groove, side length against format, technical QA, the approval workflow with the artist | [process flow](process-flow.md) stages 1 and 2, the audio checks on the [artist platform](artist-platform.md) |
| Lathe cutting | Test cuts and lacquers, groove microscopy, dead-wax scribing, pitch and depth automation (Sillitoe Space / Time Control or the Agnew route) | [vendor landscape](suppliers/vendor-landscape.md), part marking in [quality automation](quality-automation.md) |
| IT | The factory application (`cnx-factory`), data acquisition, traceability, the artist platform, operations on the NixOS fleet | [digital factory](digital-factory.md), [traceability](traceability.md), [artist platform](artist-platform.md) |
| Business administration | Costing and the price calculator, production planning and lead times, export sales and logistics, fan-funded campaigns, BOI compliance | [revenue model](finance/revenue-model.md), [production timeline](production-timeline.md), [BOI](boi.md) |
| To discuss | Music (recordings for the programme and the platform), communication arts (label and artist marketing, plant tours), science and pharmacy (the PVC material lab, galvanics chemistry) | [quality automation](quality-automation.md), [galvanics and stamper prep](equipment/galvanics.md) |

## What it changes in the plan

- **The cutting room moves up the agenda.** The [roadmap](roadmap.md) puts
  mastering and cutting last (item 27), earlier only if title-services
  demand shows up. A teaching programme is a second reason to bring it
  forward, as a room that trains students and cuts customer lacquers. The
  teacher comes before the students: an experienced cutting engineer, or
  the lathe vendor's training, has to be in place first. Student test cuts
  consume lacquer blanks and styli, a running cost to price into the
  programme.
- **Pre-release security.** Labels ask how unreleased audio is protected.
  Teaching uses own or licensed material (Poy Records, recordings from
  Payap's College of Music); customer masters only under NDA and the room
  access control in [facility security](facility-security.md).
- **Safety and access.** Students on the plant floor fall under the
  [worker safety](worker-safety.md) programme; the galvanics clean room is
  seen through the visitor corridor window, not entered
  ([crane, workshop and tours](crane-workshop-tours.md)). IT students work
  on a staging copy of the factory application and on exported data, never
  with write access to production systems.
- **Location.** On Payap land the plant and the classroom share a campus;
  at Mueang Chi they are ~35 km apart. The programme works better with the
  Payap site but need not depend on it.
- **BOI.** R&D contracted with a Thai university and training cooperation
  may count toward the R&D merit measure; an open item in [BOI](boi.md).

## Form, to agree with Payap

Start small and formal: a memorandum of understanding, internships and
work-integrated learning, and jointly taught short certificate courses in
mastering and lathe cutting. Degree tracks come later, because new degree
programmes go through the university's own curriculum approval and
national accreditation; Payap knows those lead times.

To settle in writing: who teaches what; who owns equipment used for
teaching; lathe and room time for teaching against production; fees and
how they are shared; who owns student work that uses plant data; and
confidentiality.

**Questions for the next meeting:** which faculties and programmes, on what
timeline; what Payap expects from CNX (instructors, equipment, internships,
funding); whether the programmes are tied to the land lease.